Waiting For Gateau
by Invisible Ranger
Summary: Response to the ATSB Quick Pick "Waiting." While waiting on a routine mission, Murdock remembers one of his first jobs as a teenager.


"Waiting For Gateau"

By Mizhowlinmad (HBF), 2009

Summary: Response to the ATSB Thursday To-Do "Waiting." A look back at one of the Team members' first jobs.

Rating: PG-13 for violence and profanity

Warnings: None, unless you hate a butchered attempt at a Cajun and/or Texas dialect.

Disclaimer: The A-Team belongs to SJC and Universal, not me. I'm just borrowing them for an order of etoufee and a generous bowl of crawfish bisque. Apologies also to the great Samuel Beckett for the punny title.

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I look at my watch again. Two minutes gone by.

_Dammit. I'm bored._

"Murdock, you awake over there?"

My head's been tilting forward ever so slightly. It snaps up.

"Yep. It's quiet out here."

"Too quiet." Face agrees, his features obscured by the thick mist and a layer of greasepaint. "Didn't I say that once?"

My lips quirk. I always like it when he says stuff like that. "It's the kinda thing that bears repeating."

Nothing's moving. Just the waves far below, and the tendrils of that coastal fog, stroking my cheeks like a lover's hands. It smells like earth, and dried seaweed. We've been up here at least an hour, flat on our bellies, armed, waiting. No sign of the Colonel, or B.A. They're paying a little midnight visit to Mr. Renaldo "Razor" Melgar, who owns a beach cottage at the bottom of the cliff. He also owns one of the largest cocaine operations in Southern California.

I don't think the Colonel's dropping in to sell Melgar some vacuum cleaner attachments or encyclopedias.

We wait. Just in case.

"You wanna play a game, Faceman?"

I hear his almost inaudible groan. "Not 'I Spy' again?"

"Nope. How about 'Bet You Didn't Know?'"

The groan's a little louder this time. "Didn't we run that one into the ground back at the Hanoi Hilton? I mean, c'mon, Murdock…we are supposed to be working here."

_Who says you can't work and play at the same time?_

"I'll go first. What was your very first job?"

"Murdock…" he starts.

"I'm waitin', Face," I finish.

I can't quite see him in the gloaming, but I imagine he's raising an eyebrow right about now. Maybe stroking his chin. "You mean the kind of job that doesn't get the social workers riled, or Sister Mary Bartholomew smacking your wrists with the world's biggest ruler? That kind of job?"

"Uh-huh."

After a pause, he says, "I never told you guys that one, did I? I was the lifeguard at the parish swimming pool the summer I was fifteen. The hours were long, the pay was terrible, but the perks were good. All the slushees I could drink. Not to mention Katy Armstrong in that pink suit she used to wear…" He sighs. He recovers, checks his rifle for at least the third time. "Okay, your turn."

"Really?"

"Either that or play 'I Spy' with kelp and seagulls."

I hadn't expected him to show any interest. But I reach back in the dusty, cluttered corridors of my mind anyway, and come up with what I'm looking for. The memory is still there.

"Faceman, you ever had etoufee?"

"E-tou-what?"

"Lemme explain."

"Boudreauz" was spelled wrong on the sign outside, and all the menus. I tried explaining it to Old Red once, but he just laughed.

"Taint nothin' I gonna do about it now, H.M. 'Sides, ol' fella like me? Shit, I ain't never made it tru de fifth grade."

Old Red _was_ old. Tough, gnarled, weathered, like one of those sequoia trees I'd seen in a book at school. He was also big, as in fat… like he'd strapped a few spare tires beneath his stained apron. I guess the only reason he wasn't "Big Red" was 'cause the chewing gum had aleady used that idea.

I never knew his real name. He was always just Old Red Boudreaux. He was the first Cajun I ever met who I could understand at all. Course, he laughed at my East Texas twang all the time too.

He ran a little place by the same name, just behind the tracks on the east side of town. I didn't seem to notice…or care…but Boudreauz was one of the only places in town where the blacks and whites came in on equal terms, sat at the same counter, ate the same food, shot the same breeze. Red never cared.

"Dey payin' customers. I don' care none what color, dey pay, thas' good enough." And he left it at that.

Everybody came to Boudreauz for the generous helpings of Cajun food, anyway, and not the company. Most of the regulars were locals, guys in gimme caps and workingmen's clothes who just needed some home cooking and a couple beers after a long day.

But Old Red, for whatever reason, always had trouble hanging onto anyone for long. His wife, Cosette, had died a few years ago. The line cook, an angry-looking Indian called Eddie Shanks, spent half his time in a surly mood and the other half passed-out drunk. A couple local girls waited tables. And Leo Navorette, who said he was Red's second cousin once removed, or something like that. He mostly came and went, occasionally waited tables. That was the staff.

Perfect place for a misfit kid like me to work. I remember Red interviewing me.

"What kinda work you done, son?" He wasn't really paying attention, just grunting and straining to lift a crate of okra from the ground to a shelf. I wanted to help him, but didn't dare. Yet.

I swallowed. If I answered wrong, I felt like he was gonna try and eat me.

"I worked for Mr. Howard down at the Piggly Wiggly last year." I paused. _And also fired by Mr. Howard._ "Sir," I quickly added.

In an instant, Red transformed from an ogre to a big, cuddly bear. He roared. "Heh! Ain't no sir, son, jus' Ol' Red. What'choo say yo' name was?"

"H.M." I stepped cautiously forward.

"Who yo' folks? I know 'em?"

I shook my head. "I don't think so, si…I mean, Red." I decided to help him lift the crate before he had a heart attack. "They're dead. My grandpa's Al Murdock."

"Al Murdock. Short fella, lotsa bushy hair?"

"No, si…Red. He's tall like I am." I lifted the crate practically on my own and placed it on the shelf.

For the first time, Red turned and looked at me. "How ol' you right now? You skinny, but I can tell you'se strong as a hoss, boy."

"Sixteen," I lied, though I could easily pass for it.

His eyes twinkled. "What if I tol' you I need a busboy? You up for dat?"

I could feel my feet practically leaving the ground. "I could start today. I mean, if you want me to."

And that was that. He stuck out his beefy hand and almost crushed mine in the process of shaking it. He gave me a uniform that was much too big for me, a quick tour of the dining room and the kitchen, showed me what my duties were. Mostly it was clearing the tables, mopping up, emptying ash trays. Nothing I couldn't handle. Once in a while I'd get to ride my bike to the A&P (I always avoided the Piggly Wiggly now) to pick up some supplies. Every Friday I'd earn a few extra dollars. I mostly spent the money on comic books, baseball cards, stuff like that.

The weeks passed. Spring turned into the long, hot summer. I grew another couple inches, and started to fill out my uniform a little more. The only thing that never seemed to change was Red himself.

One night, after closing, I was mopping up. The lights were off, save for the neon lights over the bar and the watery light coming from Old Red's tiny office in back. Curious, I leaned the mop against the silent jukebox and tiptoed down the hallway. At the edge of the door, I looked in. Red was looking over a yellowed piece of school paper under the light of the single bulb.

He might have been old, but my boss wasn't hard of hearing. "Dat you, H.M.? C'mere. Got somethin' interestin' here." He spoke in the manner of a pirate captain poring over a cache of treasure, and beckoned me with one sausage-like finger.

"What's that?" I asked. In the time I'd worked at Boudreauz, I had learned that Old Red couldn't read much if at all. But whatever was written on the piece of paper had captured his interest.

"Dis here," he began, in a much softer tone than he normally used, "is de only recipe of my Cosette's I never did try."

I also knew that most of the food served at Boudreauz was some variant of a recipe once used by the late Mrs. Boudreaux. I wondered where he'd gotten it all of a sudden. "Where'd it come from?"

"Oh, I's goin' tru some of dese old files, bills of sale and what, and found it. In her own hand, hoo-ie."

"What's it for?" I was more curious than usual. In the few months I'd been working in the restaurant, I'd developed a certain appreciation for all things culinary.

"Dis here is for chocolate truffle gateau."

"Gateau?" It wasn't a word I'd heard before.

"Gateau," explained Red, "is a kinda rich, sweet, cake. Like Cosette was."

"Can we try the recipe?" I asked, hoping I wouldn't offend him.

"Maybe, maybe so. In time. Sometin' tells me dis one special, for jus' de right time." Reverently he replaced the lost recipe where he'd found it, in a battered red notebook. "For now…oh, is that de time?" he wondered aloud almost absently.

Before Red could answer his own question, and before I could speak, we both heard the unmistakable sound of glass shattering. I saw his eyes dart to the door, then he reached beneath his desk and pulled out a long, shiny object.

A tire iron.

"You wait in dis office, H.M." His voice was gentle, but commanding.

"But, Red…"

"I said, you wait here. Don' go nowhere." The gentle but firm growl of a watchdog. He crept out, surprisingly graceful for a man of his age and size.

I didn't know where he was going, or what he was doing. I flattened myself against the wall next to the door and peered outside. My heart hammered in my chest.

First there was the creak of the back door opening. I knew the sound even from where I stood. Then, the muffled sound of men's voices…at least two, along with Red's own. They raised in pitch to where I could almost make out what they were saying, but not quite. There was a moment of profound silence.

Then, the staccato of a pistol…one, two, three.

More silence.

Forgetting Red's order, I sprinted down the hall and kicked open the back door, an unarmed teenager, wide-eyed, and terrified. Behind the parking lot I saw the rapidly receding taillights of a truck. And there, on the blacktop beside the dumpster, was Red, looking for all the world like a beached whale.

Several red stains crept across his white T-shirt and apron. He was breathing, but shallowly. The tire iron was still clenched in his left hand.

My heart, which had been a drumbeat, was now a frantic gallop. I knelt beside him, barely feeling the asphalt tearing at my knees.

Red's lips formed a startled "O," as if he still couldn't believe he'd been shot. His eyes, pleading, met mine.

_Help_, he mouthed.

That was all I needed. I found my bike where I'd left it in the back, hopped on, and pedaled, pedaled, pedaled, like the devil himself was on my tail.

_Hang on, Red. Hang on…_

"Wait a minute. You're saying your first boss was murdered?" Face asks me. Even in the almost complete blackness, I can see how wide his eyes are.

"Second boss." I swallow. "First boss was the Piggly Wiggly guy."

"Mr. Howard."

"Right."

Neither Face nor I know quite what to say. I hadn't thought about Old Red for a while now; the memory gradually washing away like a sand castle built on the beach.

"Did they ever make any arrests?"

"No." Though I have my ideas, I've never been able to prove anything.

"What about that cake recipe?"

"What about it?" I remember it so clearly, the delicate, spidery script across the fading slip of paper.

"Did you ever find it?"

I look down over the beach, the barely-visible edge of Razor's beach house. The snowy caps of the waves. The seagrass undulating in the wind.

"No. Figured it was best to let the secret die with him, y'know?"

"Right."

Now I see something else…the beam of a flashlight, two times short, one time long, then another short.

_That means "Hang on, we're coming…watch out for any bogies."_ B.A. and Hannibal must have caught the Razor unsharpened.

Face had seen it too. He shifted his position ever so slightly. "Guess this evening wasn't a total waste after all."

"No, I guess not." Even though now we'd probably use Melgar to cut off all the other tentacles in his operation. I didn't figure this night was over.

And playing a game wasn't as much fun as I thought it would be. Damn.

We stay where we are. Still waiting. Then I remember something Face said to me a couple weeks ago.

"Face?"

"Hmmm?"

"You still in touch with that girl...Fleur? Fifi?"

"Oh, Francesca." He must have a mental Rolodex of all these names, 'cause I never can keep them straight. "The owner of the Patisserie in Beverly Hills. Sure. Why do you ask?"

I hear the distant sound, getting closer, of voices. The Colonel sounds pissed. So does the Big Guy.

"'Cause when this is all over, I think I'm gonna need some chocolate gateau."

_Fini_


End file.
